Solana Communications Array

Solana Communications Array
Other Names	The Devil's Sandbox Solana Communication/Comm(s) Facility Solana Communication Array Solana Communication Relay
Type	Communications/jamming facility, airbase
Location	Aitor Desert, Cascadia
Coordinates	35°21'15" N, 106°53'36" W
Events	Cascadian Conflict Operation Blackout

"Cascadia's southeastern deserts host the Solana Communication Array. It was a Federation and Cascadian telecom venture meant to expand Cascadia's networking capability regardless of any thermal interference that traditionally plagues long-range communications. With that, communications between various Federation units are streamlined while limiting, jamming, and interrupting our own, nothing to say of the censorship abilities that are used to enforce the civilian information flow."

― CIF unit briefer

The Solana Communications Array was a large telecom facility in the Aitor Desert.

Overview

The array featured a forward base made up of communications towers, C-RAMs, AA guns, advanced SAMs, bunkers, and artillery units. It also had a sizable town settlement connected to a fuel complex: Three oil tanks and a refinery. A trio of cordium containers and four radar sites were present as well.

Two powerlines connected the facility to the main airbase: One travelled from the settlement from the east, while the other came from the northeastern electrical grid. The grid was powered by 91 solar panels, equally divided in 13 rows, and four adjacent substation facilities.

The main base featured huge clusters of tents and some construction equipment, possibly for further development of facilities. Six hangar facilities were gathered around a circular runway linked to a linear one, in turn located next to another series of hangars. Bunkers and railgun emplacements formed a potent defense line, guarding what appeared to be bomb shelters. Airship pickets were present above as well. A dozen oil tanks and half dozen radar sites dotted the whole base. There were ten more hangars located outside the circle, seven arranged in a row formation and three larger ones located to the westernmost part of the base.

The array's capabilities included being a communication signal booster for the operators' side while weakening the opposing force's own. It was also able to perform information censorship duties by cutting off information beyond Cascadia as well as limit the radar tracking capabilities of AWACS planes to their present areas of operations.

History

The Solana Communications Array was set up in AC 422 as part of the joint Pillars of Communications project. The array's purpose functioned according to the purpose of the Pillars: To ignore the sheer geothermal interference around North America.

Following the start of the Cascadian Conflict the following decade, the Pacific Federation secured the facility and used it to jam and weaken Cascadian Independence Force comms across the entire Cascadian theatre while boosting the Federation's own, therefore making it one of the CIF's most important targets. For almost three months, however, the array survived mainly due to its incredibly long distance from most IF forces and being covered by the Chaohord Defense Region, consequently allowing it to wreak havoc on unit coordination in the period.

The array in ruins after Sicario's raid

The CIF-hired Sicario captured and destroyed the facility on April 4 during Operation Blackout, including its neighboring airbase. With the jamming gone, communications across Cascadia were restored for the remainder of the war, leading to their first conventional victories in the conflict.

Trivia

The Solana Communications Array's US location is in Rio Rancho, New Mexico.